Scrap cargos sold off the US East Coast to Turkey have been plentiful in the last couple weeks, but prices are not showing any firming up yet. As expected, export prices have continued to deteriorate relatively quickly over the last couple of weeks despite what continues to be healthy demand from Turkish mills. In later September, a flurry of scrap cargos was booked from the US to Turkey, with the lowest HMS I/II 80:20 price reaching $360/mt CFR. Two weeks ago, however, latest HMS I/II 80:20 bookings from the US to Turkey were concluded at $365-369/mt CFR. Although some US scrap suppliers have also tried to test $370-375/mt CFR price levels for the same qualities last week, Turkish mills were not interested in offers above $365/mt CFR, as Turkish mills are currently unable to implement any price increases in their own local finished steel market.
Additionally, Turkish mills are keeping a close watch on the US domestic market, where scrap prices are beginning to settle down anywhere from $40-$60/lt compared to early September prices as a number of major mills are taking outages this month and are sitting out of the scrap market entirely. As for the US West Coast, exporter sources have indicated that the past two weeks have been silent in terms of Taiwanese scrap bookings. Even though export buying prices have come down by about $10/mt in the past week, Taiwanese mills have showed no interest in buying US scrap at the moment.